Page:Journal of the Straits Branch of the Royal Asiatic Society (IA journalofstra17181886roya).pdf/487



N the Straits Settlements the "Survey Question is one which has been before the public for some years and which, especially since 1883, has been the subject of much discussion-discussion which has just culminated in the publication by Govern- ment of a valuable report by an officer of the Survey of India (Lieut.-Colonel BARRON, B.C.S.) especially deputed to study the subject on the spot.

Some of the questions connected with land-revenue ad- ministration which have been engaging the attention of the Government of these Settlements (1,310 square miles) have recently been under discussion in a much larger Colony- Cochin China and I have thought that it may be of interest to the members of our Society, and to persons in the Colony interested in land, if I republish here in English a paper on the subject which appeared last year in the Bulletin de la Société des Etudes Indo-Chinoises de Saigon.

I have translated this paper, not because I agree with the principles which M. CAMOUILLY advocates, but because I have been desirous of understanding, in what manner it has been thought possible to carry out, in an Asiatic Colony, registration of title on the Torrens system with- out a preliminary general allotment survey. The argu- ments of the writer are chiefly directed against any project for carrying out a cadastral survey, but he does not to realise that some of these arguments, if their cogency is admitted, will militate equally against the intro- duction of the Torrens system, which he advocates. "Never think," says M. CAMOUILLY, "of carrying out a systematic survey of holdings. Do you know what the effect could be? Why you would destroy the communal system, by which the land-revenue is collected in a lump for each village and would introduce a system of revenue-settlement, holding by holding, which would give infinite trouble."

Later on, his argument in favour of the Torrens system is something of this sort:—"Annamite land-holders are terribly fleeced by money-lenders. Give them Government titles and they will be able to raise money at reasonable rates from respec- table establishments. Confine your survey to those lots which